Laura's old blog

I am not sure why I didn't send this out while Laura was alive, but I kinda assumed everyone knew she did a cancer blog...  I read a lot of it last night.  If you do not know, her last post of Sept. of 2017.

http://laurasnyderupdates.blogspot.com/

check it out...  love you all.  It's a lovely day and Im off to walk the dogs.

fine fine

All is ok. Tim is loving his mountain bike. He is riding most days. Usually just bikes from home and goes up into the forest lands and there are so many small trails people maintain off the main logging and other gravel roads up there. He loves exploring and checking the area out.

Ani has packed her Subaru up and is leaving for Moab Utah tomorrow morning. She hopes to get 600-800 miles in tomorrow and then get to Moab for bouldering and mountain biking in the sun by Thursday. She will sleep in her car and has a camp stove for cooking and coffee. She has a foam pad in the back of the Subaru and her bike fits in there too.  She is sad but doing ok. She is taking one online geology class and should graduate PSU in Dec. I bet she will be home in a couple weeks since it is getting actually cold at night in the mountain west.

I am going to work and slowly doing some deep cleaning of the house and rooms. I haven't even thought about clean Laura's things out, Im just organizing them. I have to do a better job with all the paper work. Like our amazon prime account is in her name but I will get to that at some point.

I am excited to fly to Boston on Saturday oct 26 and then back to Oregon the next Sat. nov 2 I think. It will be good to go east for a bit. That's all folks. we are fine.  Just trying to figure this life thing out.

We are OK

We have made it past the 4 week, one month and even 5 weeks past Laura died.  Every Friday, Ani and I and others (Rachel's work alarm clock goes off at the time I called her on Friday Sept. 6 to tell her Laura passed) think of Lauras passing.

It has been a beautiful weekend and I have played with my gardens and yard most of the weekend. Art walk, music and dancing last night. I went out with John and Rachel W. They left me to dance away the night at Holiday Friends at the end of the evening.  Israel Nebeker (lead singer for Blind Pilot) sang a set at a new black box theater in Astoria. It was lovely.

Tim has bought a mountain bike and he and Ani have gone biking together and he has been out on his own this weekend. He is really happy about the bike and it is such a good thing for him!  I feel like a cloak has lifted seeing Tim happy. Ani and I had a big long joint cry together Friday night. It was the first time both of us were crying together. It was kinda sweet.

I have been doing a stupid diet since Oct.1. Its called whole 30. basically just meat, potatoes, veggies and nuts. NO sugar, grains (corn), dairy (eggs are allowed since they are not really dairy at all but fowl) alcohol or fun. No, fun is still allowed on the diet. Its a good reset for me.  It will actually only be Whole 26 since I am flying east on Oct. 26 and will stop my diet while on vacation. Some of Laura's college room mates and friends are gathering to tell stories about her on Oct 26 which Im crashing and then Ill see my Mom and friends.

My work team was honored by the Astoria School District as an important community partner.

The dogs are OK. Louis has recovered from his raccoon incident but he now lets Mia take the lead in night time forays into the yard

My red poppies self seed throughout the garden and this is an example of the third bloom, die, reseed and bloom again in the garden this summer. We often get two sets of blooms but this is the first year we have gotten three blooms.

more nothing to say

As advertised, I don't really have anything to say. I just looked and that is how I started the last post. I have done things like fold my own laundry for the first time. I admit that I bought a six pack of underwear on Amazon which gave me one more week of not doing laundry!  Laura liked folding cloths. Or maybe she really didn't like the way I folded clothes, but what ever the reason she always folded the clothes. I would often carry laundry around and start and change laundry around but Laura would always fold the laundry in front of the tv at night.

I haven't been watching any tv either besides Timbers soccer games. I will catch a baseball game during the playoffs. Im sure I'll check out some Patriots at some point as well. I go to bed between 9-10 but I am able to sleep again. Lucky me.  I wake up super early but that's fine with me. Ani isn't sleeping much.

Ani and I went to a little brew fest Friday night and it was wicked fun. I danced like a mad man and she talked to all kinds of my friends.  She even said,"Dad you have some really fun friends. Where have you been hiding them."  Haha.  Ya Ani I do have fun friends. How strange huh?!

Louis got the crap beat out of him by a raccoon a week ago. I heard him barking and then he was screaming and yelping. I ran outside in the pitch dark and kicked the raccoon off him and he ran towards the house and the darn raccoon jumped him again and I had to kick it off him a second time! I did take him to the vet the next day and while his rabies shot was up to date, they gave him a second one and antibiotics.  He had a couple dozen puncture wounds on his butt and back legs.  Poor boy.  The night he get jumped, he came inside and trembled on Ani's lap for a long time.

Both kids have been sick but are both on the mend. Ani got signed up for her last upper division geology class. Its an online class through UO and she will graduate with her degree in December as long as she passes! Its a geologic hazards class which is actually fun stuff as long as you like earthquakes, tsunamis, volcanoes, land slides and such. So cool!

I guess this work week has been harder than others. I had to pull my car over cause I was crying so hard after a meeting on Monday. I ended up going directly to the gym at Clatsop CC and took the rest of the afternoon off. It's just a bit lonely and sad around this corner of the world.

I have started doing the death paper work- getting Laura's name off stuff. It's stupid. Social Security Administration not only wants an original death certificate, but an original birth certificate and an original marriage licence! So Stupid.  Laura's Mom, Barbara, was so kind and went to the City of Springfield MA and got a new Birth Certificate for me!  I doing this, I unearthed passports of Laura and I when we were 23 and 22 respectively. Below is a photo of them:

Louis right after the mean raccoon mugged him and bite up his hind legs and butt.

Proof that the sun is still setting in the west.

Oh one cool thing is that Ani left home yesterday morning at 2:50 am and picked up her wingperson, Annik, and they climbed Saddle Mountain in the dark.  They got to the top a long time before sunrise and watched the stars from a moonless sky high in the Oregon Coast Range and saw shooting starts as well as an alien spaceship.  Then sunrise was amazing. Here is a taste of it below:

nothing new

I am not really sure what to say. We are moving along. Kinda numb just one step at a time kinda thing. Its been over two weeks since Laura died. I am not sure if I should say Laura died or passed or passed away. To me it is easier to day died since it seems more real and permanent, but that has taken people aback so I have said passed away more this week while thinking died in my head. Semantics were always important to her.

I really resisted putting her obituary in our local paper. (more local politics about the local paper than anything) But in the end, she was a public figure: store owner and on the Astoria School Board, so Cathy, Ani and I wrote one.  Ani and I fought over it as we were at each-others throats the week after she died. In the end, the obit reached people I wanted to know and it was the right thing to do.

Ani and I are doing well as far as our relationship is concerned.  We are both stumbling along numb.  Tim too finds it hard and the dogs are a mess.  The dogs are driving whoever is home crazy with their needyness.

Ani is keeping her room in Portland until Oct. 15 and then moving back home full time. She is finishing her PSU Geology degree with an online geology class from the University of Oregon.  I started back at work full time last Monday and am currently doing a SAT Test Prep workshop for high school students.  The students are taking practice tests while I type this...  Tim is still painting houses but plans on stopping soon.

Ani, Tim and I celebrated our 25th wedding anniversary at Buoy Beer with burgers and fries. We toasted Laura and her tenacity to put up with me for so long...

I am borrowing a cider press from a friend late today and will press apples and pears tomorrow for my 2019 hard cider vintage.  It will be a fun and yellow jacket filled affair I am sure.

One step in front of the other and see where it leads us.

 I plan on having Thanksgiving at our house cause its one of my favorite holidays and then do Christmas/Hanukkah somewhere else.  Maybe on a beach but we have not gotten that far.  At least I can plan to tomorrow now and not just dinner tonight.

Celebration of Life Video

https://www.dropbox.com/s/7qfdpaqo87577xi/Laura%20Snyder%20Memorial%20Service.mov?dl=0

The above is a video of the ceremony of Laura's celebration of life.  Richard is also going to put it on you tube. I did not have any issues watching this but some people get some buffering issues...

I will write more soon.

we are ok ish.

celebration

The Celebration of Life for Laura was beautiful.  Here is what I said:

Thank you for being here. I will talk about my strong smart wife. I really met Laura through mutual friends Lars and Arria. While Lars was fishing, Arria invited Laura and I to a Sweet Honey in the Rock Concert in Bellingham Washington. I drove up to Lummi Island from Astoria and Laura drove up from Seattle. The concert was fun but what I remember was the sleeping situation. Laura got the pull out couch and I got the floor with a visiting pug. I tried to talk my way up onto the couch bed repeatedly, and Laura kept saying stay on the floor with the snoring pug!

That weekend I asked Arria if Laura was single and she laughed. Ya, Laura is single and NOT your type. I still managed to get Laura’s address and spent the next two or three months writing letters. Somehow, through my dyslexic handwriting and spelling, I started to win her over. I had a training in Olympia and Laura agreed to have me come to her little home in Seattle for the weekend after the training. It was a fun weekend doing Seattle tourist stuff. We bought golden trout at Pikes Place Market and I showed her how to lift one fillet off the bones and then pull the head and backbones out of the lower fillet. In retrospect, that was the first time I prepared her seafood. Our only prenuptial was that whenever we eat seafood, I shell, crack, debone it on my plate and give her food that is fork ready on her plate.

On Sunday morning of that first weekend when Laura was puttering in the kitchen or showering, I was in her bedroom going through things. I am not proud, just curious. I found a box of old single earrings in one drawer and was shocked to see a silver and abalone earing that I recognized. I brought it out to Laura and she said what were you doing to find that? I just looked cute and said lets talk about that in a minute, when and where did you get this earing? She said she got it at the end of high school but I don’t wear it anymore since I lost the other one where I was at Bowdoin. I smiled and said that I was cleaning up after a Thursday Night Party at Bowdoin and found that earing 9 years ago and if you come down to Astoria next weekend, you can have your earring back.  I totally got a free pass on rifling through her stuff with that bit of coincidence and magic. I have the earrings here if you want to see them.

We spent 6-8 months having a city house and country house till she moved to Astoria in March of 1993. It was quite a culture shock for Laura. During that time, I got my first raise and bought a hot tub. It was in that hot tub that Laura said I want a baby. I told her that I always envisioned myself as a father and wanted a baby too. She said great. Lets start this baby making business but I said we can’t. She just looked at me and said I think we can, Jon. We can’t have children until we are married I replied. Again, she said she begged to differ and it was very possible to have a kid without being married. That started a long discussion on the patriarchal oppression of marriage and how she thinks its an out dated tradition and on and on.

Then when it was clear to Laura that I was not convinced that we could indeed have a baby without being married she said, lets look at this in a different way. I want a baby and more specifically your baby. You want to have a baby with me right? I said yes. OK, said Laura we are now engaged and lets get Married as soon as possible so I can have a baby.  The next day, my mom express mailed the engagement ring she had from my father. And we were married on a beach in Maine on September 17, 1994.

We are the epitome of opposites attract. Laura is brilliant, sarcastic, introspective, and an introvert - I am not. This dichotomy always kept us on our toes. After Tim was born, I started working half time so we could share the child raising. I worked Monday, Tuesday and Wednesday and Laura went to Lucy’s Books Thursday Friday and Saturday with a family day on Sundays. Somehow, the kids survived the wildly different yet loving approach to child rearing. She sang songs to the kids every night as they were going to bed. On the nights she was out, I got in trouble with Ani for changing the words of the songs to fit my mood.

Laura battled cancer for seven long years. She rarely complained. As her dementia ate away at her brain all her sarcasm melted away and from May on she was so stinking sweet- not that she wasn’t sweet before, but it was more of a biting sweetness. Next Tuesday is our 25^th wedding anniversary. It is really something for Laura to have been married to me for that long. I am a handful and she tried her hardest to keep me in line. I guess that now falls on Ani, Tim and the posse of girlfrineds…  Good luck.

The day before she died was the last time she was fully conscious and could both talk and understand what we were saying.  It was 530 in the morning. I asked if she was warm enough, Laura said yes; I asked are you in pain, Laura said I don’t know; I said, its ok to let go and slip onto the next adventure and Laura said I can’t; I said I love you and she turned her head and looked at me with far away eyes and said I know. That’s the last actual words I heard her say.

Laura will always be with all of us. This yawning hole of grief will pass in time as it does and Laura will still be within each of us.

Thank you.